Bridging the gap between human memory and perception

IMAGE: The hippocampus may relay predictions about what we expect to see based on past experience to the visual cortex, suggests a human neuroimaging published in JNeurosci. The study is among...
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Credit: Kok and Turk-Browne, JNeurosci (2018)

The hippocampus may relay predictions about what we expect to see based on past experience to the visual cortex, suggests a human neuroimaging published in JNeurosci. The study is among the first to examine the interaction between these two aspects of cognition.

Associating two different sensory experiences, such as hearing a bark with seeing a dog, allows people to perceive the world more efficiently than relying on sensory input alone. How the brain "fills in" this perceptual information, however, is unclear.

Investigating the relationship between sound cues and visual shapes in the brain, Peter Kok and Nicholas Turk-Browne found that the hippocampus represents what one expects to see while the visual cortex represents what is actually seen. Expectations in the hippocampus were related to visual processing, suggesting a mechanism by which memory can inform perception.

JNeurosci, the Society for Neuroscience's first journal, was launched in 1981 as a means to communicate the findings of the highest quality neuroscience research to the growing field. Today, the journal remains committed to publishing cutting-edge neuroscience that will have an immediate and lasting scientific impact, while responding to authors' changing publishing needs, representing breadth of the field and diversity in authorship.

About The Society for Neuroscience

The Society for Neuroscience is the world's largest organization of scientists and physicians devoted to understanding the brain and nervous system. The nonprofit organization, founded in 1969, now has nearly 37,000 members in more than 90 countries and over 130 chapters worldwide.

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